1. Field of Use
The present invention relates to knowledge-based systems and, more particularly, to the use of such systems in performing dump analysis.
2. Prior Art
Computer operating systems characteristically use control structures to maintain order in processing. The control structures of an operating system are small collections of related information pertaining to some feature of the operating system.
When a computer system encounters a major problem requiring an interruption of its operation, a physical memory dump is generated for subsequent analysis by system engineers before the system shuts down. Such memory dumps represent the state of the operating system control structures at the time the problem appeared in the system.
Dump analysis is a difficult task. Dumps usually contain a substantial amount of information which encompasses the totality of the operating system structures distributed throughout memory in an unpredictable fashion. Furthermore, since numeric notations (hexadecimal numbers usually) are typically used to represent operating system structures, the interpretation of dumps is generally left to experts for deciphering. Finally, dump analysis requires specific knowledge about operating system structures of specific computer systems that only a few experts possess.
To facilitate the dump analysis task, some system tools have provided facilities for generating a human readable display of memory values in response to user commands. One such system is described in copending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 06/913,157, filed on Sep. 26, 1986. This system provides customized displays from memory or memory dumps with differing internal structure format, by storing a description of the operating system structures in a control structure file which is separate from the program.
In this system, only the control structure file needs to be modified when changes in operating system structures occur. Other system tools provide disassemblers that translate numeric words back into the corresponding assembly language instructions, thus making the dump more human readable or understandable.
While such tools do make dump analysis a less cumbersome task by enabling the display of the operating system structures contained in a dump in a more understandable form, the user is still required to know in advance where to look and what to look for. To the extent that the user does not know where a specific structure is located, the user must browse or search through the operating system structures. This requires additional time and a certain difficulty. Also, even with a good display capability, users still must be able to recognize that they have found the desired information when they see it.
Accordingly, it is a primary object of the present invention to provide a system which automates the analysis of memory dumps.
It is a further object to provide a system which minimizes the amount of time and knowledge required to locate the symptom of a problem resulting in a dump.